Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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HThe (gamecock Hodges to unveil plan for lottery * in television ads Associated Press GREENVILLE—Gov Jim Hodges lias a 24-page operating plan for a state edu cation lottery that is being described in a new series of television ads. Under the plan, half the money put into a lottery, about S416 million, would go to prizes, 14 percent would go to re tailers and administration costs and 36 percent would be put into scholarships and other education programs. That means $150 million would go into scholarships — including a free tecli , nical college education for every South ^Carolinian, tuition-free master’s degrees for teachers and classroom technology improvements No Lottery 2000 director Kathy Bigham described the proposal as “noth ing new,” adding that it is “just one per son’s proposal” mid would require leg islative approval. Voters will decide in a Nov. 7 referendum whether the state’s . constitution should be changed to allow a lottery. The advertisements describing the >. plan started airing Sunday around the state. : They ’re paid for by contributions to South Carolina Lottery for Better Schools Coali tion. Hodges was elected in 1998 with mi education lottery as the centerpiece of : his campaign. He’ll talk about the details of die plan duriiig a news conference Mon day. ^ About 110,000 new college scholar ships would be created under the plan. That includes $2,000 scholarships that would be added to the value of existing state-funded LIFE scholarship of $3,000. The scholarship also would go to students who don’t meet current SAT require ments, a score of 1050, for that scholar ship. Hodges’ proposal would boost the value of LIFE scholarships to $5,000 and Palmetto Fellow awards to $7,000 yearly. The state spends about $80 million yearly on scholarsliips, ranging from $5,000 for the Palmetto Fellow awards to an av erage of $232 for needs-based grants for students at private colleges. List year, the state gave out 50,201 grants under four year programs. But many high school graduates don’t get the awards. Blacks, who make up a third of the state’s population, get fewer awards. For example, 75 black students were among the 2,656 Palmetto Fellows last year and they were just over 12 per cent of the 17,028 Life scholarship re cipients. The plan also calls for a seven-mem ber commission, appointed by the gov ernor raid approved by the Senate, to over see the lottery’s operations. A privately-run, state chartered lottery cor poration, subject to the state’s open meet ings and open records laws, would run the lottery. The retailers selling tickets would have to post performance bonds raid could lose license for violating rules. While critics say lottery players face some of gambling’s longest odds, Hodges plan says player will play “because they believe in the cause and enjoy the un derdog nature of buying a $1 ticket.” Secretary of State Jim Miles, rat out spoken opponent of the lottery, said South Carolina can pay for the program from the growth in state revenue without re sorting to state-sponsored gambling. Miles said recent state sales tax re ports suggest the state may sec a S120 miliion-a-year revenue increase because money formerly spent on video poker gambling is going into taxable goods raid l in 5 college males became sexually active by age 13, according to survey by Dietrich Epperson The Gamecock A significant number of college males have had sex before the age of 13, according to a recent national sur vey. One in five college-age males, 18 to 24 years old, first had sex by the age of 13, according to the survey. Only 6 percent of college-age females reported hav ing sex at such an early age, compared to 21 percent of male respondents. These figures are based on a random-digit telephone survey of American attitudes toward sexuality. The sur vey was conducted by Yankelovich Partners and was released in September. Sophomore Whit Nelson, an undeclared major, found the numbers to be of no surprise. “One in five? Yeah, that sounds right to me.’’Nel son said. Business sophomore Sierra Stougli had a different I ' opinion about the results. “Oh, that’s awful,” Stough said. “Kids that age can’t cope with the repercussions of a decision of that im portance.” While the numbers were quite a surprise to Stough. ;uid others, they were nothing new-to Tricia Pltaup, sex ual health and violence prevention director at USC. “Those numbers don’t surprise me. We are find ing that Americans are having sex at a younger and younger age,” Phaup said. According to the survey, college-age adults are twice as likely to have had sex by age 13 thiui their parents. Phaup isn’t sure whether the numbers for USC stu dents are identical to the survey. But she did cite a study in 1997 that found that 85 percent of University 101 students were sexually active before coming to USC. Some experts find this trend disturbing. Ronald Fein tech, a certified sex therapist, said, “I would be hard pressed to-say that sexual intercourse for children un der 13 is age appropriate or developmental^ positive.” % Individuals who engage in sex at such an early age are also at greater risk of getting STDs and AIDS, said Susan Fulmer, S.C. AIDS Training Network program manager. “Of the approximately 40,000 new cases of HIV in the USA each year, about half are young people, a ma jority of whom are infected sexually,” Fulmer said. To combat this growing national trend, Fulmer stressed the importance of education in regards to HIV prevention and sexual health. “If we want to see a reverse in this trend, we need more education about sex and HIV prevention for young people. It can’t just be in the home. A lot of parents are in denial; they think that everyone is having sex ex cept for their own children. It is crucial that more ed ucation is provided in the schools and in the commu nity,” he said. The university desk can be reached at gamecockudesk@hotmail.com. -1 VIV.^3. V4y Hot... Do 5onet^r»g Ce©i?i getttatg»g.««n Extraordinary jobs and careers - the people who have them and how to get them! ' m L™_M [2000 Fall Semester Faculty Seminar Seriesf Tuesdays@6:30 p.m. Preston College Seminar Room "Sponsored by the Preston College Peer Coordinators For more information, contact Patrick Pope ta 544-1703 Modern Takes on Mouldy Masters: New Yorker Parodies October 10 Drs. 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